


Get Me Right (Or, Five Things That Never Happened to Rachel Berry)

by gilligankane



Category: Glee
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-11
Updated: 2010-06-11
Packaged: 2017-11-17 07:48:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/549243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gilligankane/pseuds/gilligankane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five things that never happened to Rachel Berry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Get Me Right (Or, Five Things That Never Happened to Rachel Berry)

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for 1x17 Bad Reputation, 1x22 Journey, and 1x18 Laryngitis

i. Straight Talk

Her father smiles at her, clearly amused by her actions. She ignores him and sits up impossibly taller; squares her shoulders sternly and taps her stack of papers against the coffee table in front of her. Six pages, single-spaced, 12-point font, Times New Roman, stapled kitty-cornered on the left side; just the way her teachers like it. She has two copies in her hands, one for each father, and a third copy on the table in front of her so she has something to read off of as she explains her predicament to her parents.

“I regret to inform you,” she begins primly, pausing dramatically to cross one leg over the other, gauging the reaction of her audience as they scan the top sheet of their packets.

Her father no longer looks amused; he looks worried and overwhelmed.

“Rachel,” her dad starts slowly, his eyes widening as he flips through the small stack of computer paper. She smiles widely; he must have come across the diagram she’d printed on the internet, because he’s tilting his head and turning the paper and then quickly looking away. Her father looks oddly at his husband before moving to open his own packet, but her dad stops him, shaking his head almost imperceptivity.

Rachel grins widely. “As I was saying,” she continues. “I regret to inform you, that unfortunately, I find myself enthusiastically attracted, physically of course, to members of the male species. Exclusively,” she adds, just in case there’s any room for doubt.

Her father lets out a cough that sounds like it pulls against his vocal chords roughly and she makes a mental note to brew some tea after dinner. Her dad’s normally dark face pales considerably. She falters for a moment, suddenly unsure if she should have dove head first in this.

Kurt, though, told her it was the best thing to do; to just get it out there and clear the air. When she asked him his advice on how to come out to her parents, he had resisted at first, claiming her actions inappropriate, but she had worn him down slowly and surely, until he told her to  _just do it_.

But the look on her parents faces – something she might classify, later, in her memoirs, as abject horror, for the audience’s sake and sympathy vote – makes her hesitate. The rest of her speech (the  _you should love me unconditionally_  and  _this shouldn’t affect any part of our relationship, except that I might entertain male suitors in our living room from time to time_  and the contrite  _I hope that you’re not too disappointed in me, Daddy_  parts) fall to the wayside and she leans forward cautiously, her hands gripping her knees tightly enough that she can feel the blood pumping under her palms furiously, her eyes already sliding into “puppy-dog” mode.

“Daddy,” she says slowly. The back of her throat burns a little –  _definitely tea_ , she thinks absently – but she clears it and takes a deep, solid breath. “Daddy, I’m straight,” she whispers, immediately sobbing loudly and violently, throwing her face into her hands. “I’m sorry.”

There’s a quiet moment broken only by the sound of her crying, before a loud rustle alerts her to someone moving, and then she’s being scooped up into her father’s arms, his glasses pressing painfully into her temple. She lets out another strangled wail and buries her face into his cat sweater, painfully aware that this would have been such a better bonding moment if she were wearing her own cat sweater. He smoothes her hair away from her wet cheeks when she pulls back, smiling at her.

“Oh, sweetie, there’s nothing to be sorry about.” He spares a glance at his husband who nods eagerly. “We love  _you_ , no matter who you choose to be with.”

“You’re still our little girl,” her dad agrees, reaching a lanky arm over the table to grasp her hand. “Always.”

She sniffles, perking up, wiping a flat palm under her eyes. “Really?” she asks, hopeful.

Her father laughs loudly in her ear. “Of course! You didn’t think we’d love you any less, did you?”

She blushes and ducks her head. “No,” she says sheepishly, because while she really didn’t think it entirely, the thought had crossed her mind that she, Rachel Berry, was going to end up being the biggest disappointment in her parent’s lives, instead of the star she’s destined to become.

Her father chuckles, gently this time, and wraps her in a up in a hug, cat sweater to argyle. “How about some special Berry Berry frozen yogurt?”

Rachel smiles widely and nods eagerly. “With sprinkles? Not the rainbow ones, obviously,” she adds solemnly.

Her dad nods. “I think we have just regular chocolate ones somewhere,” he says, with only the barest hint of sadness. “We’ll make sundaes out of them!”

They scamper into the kitchen and Rachel waits a moment, taking a deep, deep breath and the time to stack all of her papers back together, arranging them in alphabetical order (Dad, Daddy, Rachel) and sliding them back into her plain file folder. She stands up straight, composing herself and steels her shoulders again, solidly, wiping away the remnants of any tears.

A proper star can’t be seen crying, after all, unless she’s being paid to do it.

\---

ii. Run, Joey, Run

It took a lot of empty promises and wide, face-pulling smiles, but Finn takes the wings hesitantly, his face twisted in embarrassment and confusion, and disappears into the boys locker room, coming out a few minutes later dragging a sheepish Puck behind him, both adorned with white, cotton-fluff wings around their shoulders.

“This is  _crap_ ,” Puck mutters, but Finn elbows him in the side and he closes his mouth in a scowl.

Rachel smiles brightly, genuine, and pats his arm as far up as she can reach before turning and all but sprinting to the parking lot, trusting Artie and the AV club to film the very simple fog-filled hallway scene.

Quinn is leaning against a truck parked in the far corner of the empty lot, near the house that faces the school, staring lazily ahead.

“So let me see if I’ve got this,” she starts as soon as Rachel is within hearing distance. “You’ve got crazy Mr. Ryerson, with a  _shotgun_ , aimed at me while we sing a song about you dying?”

Rachel sighs again. “Quinn, I’ve already explained the premise of the story to you. What about it don’t you understand?” she asks, exasperated.

“The Mr. Ryerson with a  _gun_  part,” Quinn screeches. The man in question, calming the shine of his bald spot down in a portable makeup mirror a few feet away, looks at them curiously, but turns back to his task. Rachel steps closer, turning on her mega-watt smile – the one she knows Quinn can’t resist – and reaches out, hooking her thumbs into the pockets of the leather jacket Quinn is wearing.

“It’s not loaded,” she says quietly. “You have nothing to worry about.”

Quinn knows this, but she pouts anyway, looking away across the concrete to the school. “Yeah, well…”

“I know,” Rachel coos. “But I’ll protect you, baby.”

The blonde scoffs and lets her arms loop around Rachel’s waist, pulling her in even closer, ignoring a high gasp that sounds like Mr. Ryerson. “ _I’m_ the one in the badass jacket.  _I’ll_  protect  _you_.”

“You do look very James Dean-ish, I will say.”

“I don’t want any trouble,” Quinn parrots in a low voice, smirking wildly.

Rachel feels something that must be an awful lot like swooning. “Too bad you’ve got a gun pointed at you.”

Quinn rolls her eyes at the baited statement and ignores her. “You sure you only need me for this one scene?”

If she tenses, Quinn doesn’t notice, but she lets her body relax a little, looking away guilty. She tries not to think about Santana waiting at the Lopez house in a similar leather jacket, or Brittany in yet another jacket sitting probably still dancing in the Glee room where Rachel left her five minutes ago. Instead, she lifts onto her tip toes – the only way to reach Quinn’s ear in these slippers she’s wearing – and balances herself on Quinn’s shoulder.

“ _Daddy, please don’t. It wasn’t her fault._ ”

She feels Quinn’s smirk against her own smile and drops back down, taking a teasing step back.

“ _Daddy, please don’t. We’re gonna get married_ ,” Quinn continues. “Just you wait and see,” she whispers.

Mr. Ryerson whistles shrilly. “Let’s go, people. Fame waits for no one.”

Quinn rolls her eyes and Rachel indulges her for a moment, then grabs her hands and pulls her to the predetermined marker, sighing at Quinn’s lack of motivation on her monumental project.

Fame won’t wait for Quinn, either. No matter if she’s wearing that jacket or not.

\---

iii. Journey

Jesse looks over at her as if to say  _who do these kids think they are_? She nods her agreement and settles further into her chair, trying her best to keep her laugh firmly inside her mouth, because Ms. Corcoran does not look lightly upon insulting other choirs in public.

Especially if they’re going to annihilate said choirs in upcoming competitions; it’s just not classy.

These New Directions kids are the best practical joke in show choir since Oral Intensity tried to use a dancing toothbrush in their Grease medley, or so Rachel has heard over the last few months.

“Journey is classic, sure,” Jesse says, launching into his  _this is why we’re better than everyone else_  tone. “But it lacks originality. And there’s too much...” He pauses and frowns. “God, I don’t even know. I’m not sure if the stage is dripping in  _desperation_ , or if they’ve managed to honestly spill their hearts on that perfectly polished floor.”

Ms. Corcoran leans forward in her seat, a couple of people over, and shushes them, her eyes narrowed.

Jesse shoots her a fake apologetic smile and Rachel nods authoritatively, like she’s going to be the one to keep Jesse in line.

“I think it’s their heart,” Rachel whispers furiously, as soon as Ms. Corcoran sits down. “I believe it is mandatory for the underdog to try and stomp their competition with their  _love_  of show choir.”

Jesse snorts. “Terrible.”

“They can’t all be superior, like us, you know. It’s just reality that some teams, unfortunately, well… suck.”

“That was ineloquent,” Jesse notes, eyes brows lifting.

Rachel frowns at him, sparing a quick glance at Ms. Corcoran before turning back to him. “Yes, well, their lack of raw talent and general pathetic nature render me somewhat speechless.” They both roll their eyes and cross their arms over their chest, glaring at the stage as New Directions finishes up, their expected power note coming at the predicated time, their male lead ambling around like a headless chicken.

Even from her seat, Rachel can see that it’s not just  _heart_  they’ve got; there’s real desperation there, shining in their eyes, practically spraying the audience with it. Jesse clicks her tongue and she follows suit only half a second behind.

The curtains close and Jesse holds out his hand as they move through the aisle, heading onstage to wait patiently for when they will inevitably take home their first-place trophy. She stands under the hot lights with Jesse gripping one hand almost painfully, and Ms. Corcoran holding the other gently, squeezing it in time with Rachel’s heart beating against her ribcage.

Oral Intensity takes the runner-up’s trophy and Vocal Adrenaline claps graciously, each of them humming with the kind of excitement most of them might not feel once they graduate high school.

She spares a glance at New Directions and wishes she hadn’t. They all look exhausted and worn down and completely excited, because they think they have a chance and it breaks the littlest part of heart that Rachel has left.

A part of her wonders if she ever looked like that, when she was one of them, one of the losers.

Another part doesn’t allow herself to answer the question, because she knows that she didn’t just look like that; she looked  _worse_  than that, all optimistic and energetic and so sure of herself.

Mercedes is breathing heavily, trying to force air into her lungs. Kurt is clutching one of her hands, bouncing on the tips of his toes. Matt and Mike are swaying towards each other until Mike plants his feet and puts a hand on Matt’s shoulder, holding them both steady. Tina is perched on the arm of Artie’s chair, her feet barely touching the ground while Artie rocks them forward a little, then back. Brittany has Santana’s hand in her own, pressed against where her heart is, and both of the Cheerios eyes are closed, their mouths in firm lines. Finn only glances at her quickly before he looks away again, clapping a hand down on Mr. Schuester’s back. Becky Jackson, who stepped in when Rachel stepped out, is bouncing excitedly next to Finn, her hands wrapped around his forearm, pulling him down with each bounce. Puck stands behind Mr. Schuester, his arms crossed over his chest, his face drawn and pale, glaring at directly at Rachel, probably burning a hole in her forehead, if it’s possible.

The only person missing is Quinn, but Rachel heard a rumor that she went into labor, had the baby, and sent the club back to Regionals with the misguided hope that they had a chance at winning.

“Baby,” she hears in her ear, pulling her attention back to Sue Sylvester, red from head to toe, holding that scared envelope. “Pay attention.”

She looks up slightly and to her left. “Sorry, Mom.”

Ms. Corcoran smiles down at her sadly, using her free hand to brush a loose strand of hair off Rachel’s forehead. “I know, sweetie,” she says, talking about more than Rachel’s lack of attention.

“Ahem,” Sue Sylvester says into the microphone, clearing her throat obnoxiously loud. “The 2010 Midwest Regional Show Choir Champions are…”

She hopes that New Directions can draw some comfort that while their Glee program is over – the reason Rachel left when her mother offered her the chance, because New Directions was a sinking ship and Rachel was a floatation device – they have a new baby they can distract themselves with.

She hopes that New Directions will stop sending her hate mail and writing  _TRAITOR_  on her new Range Rover.

She hopes that Quinn will start taking her phone calls again, so she can explain herself.

She’ll never admit it, but she hopes New Directions – with their heart and their emotion and their obvious  _want_  of this award – will win, this time, because they deserve it more.

“…Vocal Adrenaline!”

\---

iv. But I’m A Cheerleader, Or, I Want To Be

They laughed, at the beginning of the summer, when she showed up at McKinley’s track, her hair pulled back tightly and her shorts a respectable length. None of them looked like her; sure, there were some brunettes – a girl named after a guitar player who snarls more than everyone else – and there are even some shorter girls – not everyone is a giant like that Brittany girl – but overall, she’s the only one who looks like she doesn’t belong.

They laugh and laugh until Coach Sylvester hollers at them through her bullhorn that champions aren’t bred by humor, they’re bred through hard work and tears and sweat and blood and the vomit that follows those three things.

Everyone snaps to attention, then, even Quinn Fabray, who was sitting on the bleachers a minute ago, ordering around other soon-to-be-freshman like it was her job.

By the end of the first day, it  _is_  her job.

Quinn Fabray, Head Cheerleader, stalks through the rows of wanna-be cheerleaders, berating them in a manner that has Coach laughing maniacally from the bleachers. She stops in front of Rachel and the brunette misses a step, her left foot coming down on her right foot, and she stumbles.

She closes her eyes, braced for the fall and the verbal assault, but warm hands are clutching her elbows, hoisting her back and someone is shaking her until her eyes open again.

Quinn is staring down at her and Rachel hesitates a moment before she scrambles out of the blonde’s hold quickly. “Sorry,” she murmurs under her breath, ducking her head.

The threatening Cheerios captain doesn’t say anything, or even acknowledge her apology; she continues down the row of girls, pulling Brittany out of the line and putting her up front.

“Try and see if you slackers can follow Brittany,” she commands.

By the end of the second day, half the girls are following Brittany to the locker room and half of them are running to their cars, crying at their verbally abusive dismissal from the Cheerios.

Rachel is part of the group allowed to shower for the first time in two days, and she relishes in the hot water while simultaneously trying to avoid staring at every other girl in the room.

She can’t help it, though.

She spends most of her shower staring, subtly, at Quinn Fabray, Head Cheerleader, because Rachel has always been fascinated by the girl who can bring a whole room to its feet and bring them right back down. Quinn possesses the kind of power Rachel dreams about at night; has dreamed about, ever since they stopped being required to give Valentine’s to everyone in the class.

Rachel, every year, gets seven – all from Jacob Ben Israel – but Quinn, Quinn gets more than Rachel can count, from all different boys trying to hold her hand and all different girls who want to be her friend.

Power is addictive and Rachel Berry just wants the tiniest taste of it before she is officially labeled a loser in high school, and she’s not Quinn Fabray, but that prized Cheerios uniform is as close as she’s ever going to get.

“Berry.”

Quinn’s voice snaps her out of her head and she drops her knee sock as it slips through her lax fingers. The blonde is standing over her in that power suit, staring down at her with a hard expression, but her voice is weary when she says, “What are you doing here, Berry.”

Rachel looks around her and the room is empty except for the two of them. “I’m changing.”

Quinn makes a noise that sounds like a growl. “No, Berry. What are you doing  _here_ , trying out for the Cheerios?”

“I want to be a cheerleader,” she answers slowly.

“No, you don’t.”

She frowns and reaches into her backpack, pulling out her notebook and flipping through until she finds the  _Goals, Amended Part III_  list, pointing down at the bottom, unchecked box. “No, see, it says  _Be A Cheerleader_  right here.”

Quinn takes the notebook from her hands slowly and scans down the list before snapping the spiral around, closing it with her finger stuck in the page. “Berry, for your sake, take this list and forget about it.

“For my sake?”

The blonde nods just as slowly as Rachel spoke. “For your sake,” she repeats. “None of this… None of this will happen.”

Quinn takes a small step forward, invading the personal space Rachel never really specified she wanted, and puts the notebook down between them, leaving it open to  _Goals, Amended Part III_. She smiles a little bit, nothing like she smirk Rachel has been watching her practice since the end of seventh grade, and her hand lifts, almost touching Rachel before she pulls it back and moves away.

“For your sake,” she says one more time, turning and moving behind a row of lockers where Rachel can’t see her.

Her knee sock forgotten, she pulls her notebook into her lap, scanning it and stopping at number eleven:  _Become QuinnandRachel, The Power Couple_.

By the end of day three, Rachel has already decided to join seven clubs that she probably doesn’t belong in, but taking the school by storm  _alone_  is harder than doing it with someone else.

Even if it’s for her sake.

\---

v. When Flowers Gaze At You

Out of everyone who she’s informed, only Artie remembered.

Rachel had thought that Finn might, but ever since she stood in the middle of him and Quinn and made a decision, he has ignored everything about her except for her presence in Glee.

Still…

It’s Artie who remembers, wheeling himself into her hospital room awkwardly, barely fitting through the doors that claim to be made especially for people in his condition. He smiles sheepishly at her, propped up in front of a half a dozen pillows, and backs himself up before trying again. This time, he slides through the door effortlessly, gliding up next to her bed with a wider, more genuine smile.

“Hey.”

She stares at him, unsure if she should say anything, then aware that she can’t, even if she wanted to. Her doctors had told her to take it easy and launching into conversation, no matter how polite it is, hours after surgery isn’t a wise decision.

Artie seems to understand this. “I know you can’t really talk right now, but my mom works downstairs and I talked to the nurses. They said your surgery went well.” He reaches down into his lap where Rachel can’t see without blatantly leaning over but when he lifts his hands, he’s holding a small dry erase board and a marker. “Here. Use this.”

She takes it, smiling so wide it hurts – granted everything will probably hurt for a little while.  _Thank you_ , she scribbles out, tilting the board so she can read it.

He shrugs. “It’s not a big deal. When I was seven, I had my tonsils out and I couldn’t talk for a week. My mom used to make me carry around a notepad, but look!” Artie points excitedly. “It’s totally eco-friendly.”

 _That’s very environmentally conscious of you_.

Artie grins. “Of course it is. So, you get to eat all the ice cream you want, right?”

_They won’t give me anything but Jell-O._

“Well, I can go fix that,” he says resolutely, his hands gripping his wheels.

She taps the board hard, to get his attention. He looks back up and waits with a bemused smile.

 _Can you just stay?_  She pauses when he doesn’t move.  _My dad’s had to go to work and I don’t think anyone else is going to come_.

He frowns and wheels forward a little more, hooking one hand over the railing of the bed. “What about Finn?”

 _He hates me_  she writes simply.

“I don’t think he does.”

 _He does. Because of_  –

“Because of you and Quinn, right?” Artie finishes. “I think he’s just, hurt, I guess.”

She doesn’t write  _Yeah, well_ ,  _so am I_ but he can see it in her eyes anyway, and tactfully he ignores it. “Well, where’s Quinn?”

 _Cheerios practice. She’s trying to work off the baby weight, which I told her was ridiculous and unnecessary, because she looks amazing and I’ve mentioned that on several occasions when we’ve_  – she breaks off abruptly, erases that and writes _She’ll be by as soon as she gets out._

He nods and reaches back down into his lap, looking up at her and smiling. “I got these for you too, to brighten your dull day.” Artie blushes a little. “I read that from the inside of the card.”

They’re wildflowers – something he probably grabbed at the tiny cart by the cafeteria downstairs that she saw on her way in here earlier in the morning – and they’re messily tied together with a red ribbon the same color as the ribbon on her Sectionals dress: white and blue and sprigs of green and even some purple and Rachel has seen some beautiful things in her life (she saw the back of Barbra Streisand’s head once, maybe) but these flowers are better.

She’s never gotten flowers from anyone besides her father’s before; not from Finn or Puck that one time or even from Quinn. She’s never gotten flowers from anyone besides her father’s on any occasion other than performances, but here’s Artie in his wheelchair and his sweatervests that  _he_  never gets picked on for, handing her the worst – visually – bunch of flowers she’s ever seen, and the ache in her throat where her tonsils were is fading, giving away to nothing but a gentle burn, the kind that feels good right before it’s too much.

He’s still holding them out to her, giving her a strained  _Please take these now_  smile, but her hands won’t move and she can’t make herself write  _Thank you_  out on her dry erase board, because Artie Abrams brought her flowers.

She can put them in a vase when she gets home; try and make them live forever. And when they die, she can put them inside a book on her shelf, her yearbook, maybe, and whenever she opens her yearbook, there’ll they be: pressed and dried and flowers from a boy who cares about her; flowers from a _friend_.

“Tha-nk you,” she croaks out, one hand steady against her throat.

Artie lifts his eyebrow and smiles a little crookedly, shaking his hand minutely enough for Rachel to understand, and she wraps her hand around the stems. They feel different than any other flowers she’s held in her hands. They’re warmed with body heat and hospital fluorescent lights and one of the daises looks like it’s wilting, but they’re hers.

They’re hers.

“It’s nothing,” Artie says slowly.

“Thank you,” she whispers harshly again.

“Really,” he says, touching the back of her hand briefly. “It’s nothing.”

She doesn’t write it, but she hopes he can read it when she mouths the words  _It’s everything._


End file.
